


Bruised Skin

by NakiaSwg



Series: Percy Jackson One Shots and Imagines [3]
Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types, Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan, The Heroes of Olympus - Rick Riordan
Genre: Annabeth is lowkey judgy but we love her anyway, Argo II (Percy Jackson), Author Is Sleep Deprived, Awkward Tension, Book 3: The Mark of Athena (Heroes of Olympus), Camp Half-Blood (Percy Jackson), Camp Jupiter (Percy Jackson), Charmspeak (Percy Jackson), Crushes, Doctor Will Solace, Eidolons, Firebending & Firebenders, I changed some things but whatever, I slap percy for being a dick, Leo Valdez Needs a Hug, Mentioned Reyna Avila Ramírez-Arellano, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Minor Annabeth Chase/Percy Jackson, Minor Hazel Levesque/Frank Zhang, Minor Jason Grace/Piper McLean, New Rome (Percy Jackson), Optimism, POV First Person, Possession, Prophecies, Reyna is abit suspish, Secret Crush, Shapeshifting, Slapping, The Mark of Athena (Heroes of Olympus) Spoilers, Visions of the Future, coach hedge is violent, i love me, im a seer what about it, im sassy asf, masterpiece number 3, percy gets yelled at, sassy queen, this took me a week u had better appreciate it, will taught me how to heal :D, yeah I probably made myself op but whatever
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-04
Updated: 2021-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-17 14:54:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,394
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29843178
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NakiaSwg/pseuds/NakiaSwg
Summary: In which Leo makes a grave mistake, Percy's skin gets bruised and I get a headache.
Relationships: Annabeth Chase/Percy Jackson, Hazel Levesque/Frank Zhang, Jason Grace/Piper McLean
Series: Percy Jackson One Shots and Imagines [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2165865
Kudos: 6





	Bruised Skin

**Author's Note:**

> So, my name is Nakia, but in my DR my first name is Cordelia (I just wanted a cool name skfhjkdhf) and I'm Percy's twin, hence all the weird nicknames. (no I haven't shifted yet but I really want to sdhfskdhf)
> 
> Cordelia Jackson - C.J (Percy's nickname)  
> Cordelia - Cora (Leo's nickname), Lia (Percy's nickname)
> 
> I also scripted that Chiron is the only person who calls me Cordelia, everyone else calls me Nakia, with the exception of percy and Leo,
> 
> I literally wrote this so I could slap Percy because the decking scene has always gotten on my nerves. Genuinely I rant about it at least three times a week. Loudly. In person and online. IT MAKES ME SO MAD 
> 
> anyway, enjoy !

“Oh gods.” I doubled over, gripping my head in pain, the force of my vision hitting me like a truck. If Annabeth hadn’t caught me and sat me down on the grass, I would have fallen flat on my face.

“What- what did you see?” Annabeth sat next to me, placing a tentative hand on my leg. 

Reyna watched us suspiciously, “What just happened?”

Annabeth looked at me out of the corner of her eye, silently asking permission to tell Reyna my “secret”. I tried to nod, but that just sent a sharp pain through my head, so, through gritted teeth, I said,

“Go ahead, tell her.”

Annabeth grabbed a bag of ambrosia out of her pocket, and gave me a square, before turning to Reyna.

“She’s a seer.”

“A what?”

“Every once in a while, she’ll get a vision of the future, and when she’s in emotional control, she can see someone’s past by touching them.” Reyna sat down on a tree stump next to Annabeth, leaning forward, resting her elbows on her knees.

After eating the ambrosia, the pain in my head subsided and I could move again without feeling like I was being shot in the head.

“I also get visons when a prophecy line comes true, but that usually only happens if I’ve heard the prophecy,” I shuddered, remembering when I had the vision of Luke taking Kronos’ essence into his body. Having an idea of what I was thinking of Annabeth wrapped her arm around my shoulders.

“So..what did you see?” Annabeth repeated her earlier question.

Light flashed in the corner of my eye; a flaming comet, blasting a crater in the centre of the forum.

“That. That’s what I saw,” I replied grimly. 

“The giants? Annabeth went for her dagger, which of course was still with Terminus. “I thought you defeated them!”

“It isn’t the giants.” Reyna’s eyes filled with fire. “You’ve betrayed us.”  
  
“What? We would never!” As soon as the words left my mouth, the Argo II fired a second time, a spear wreathed in Greek fire. It flew straight towards the Senate House, lighting up the inside bright green. Gods, if anyone was in there…

“Gods, no. Reyna, you have to believe me, we would never do this,” Annabeth pleaded.

Aurum and Argentum ran to Reyna’s side, growling, but paced, as if they were unwilling to attack. Small mercies.

“You’re telling the truth,” Reyna decided.

“Of course we are, why would we do anything to jeopardise this?” I scoffed.

Reyna glared at me and Annabeth gave me a warning look. “Maybe you were not aware of this betrayal, but someone will pay.”

The forum had descended into chaos. Fistfights were breaking out all over the place.

“Bloodshed,” Reyna stared down at the forum in horror.

“We have to stop this!”

I had a feeling this might be the last time all three of us acted in agreement, but together we raced down the hill towards the forum.

∘₊✧──────✧₊∘

If weapons were allowed in the city, we would have all been dead. The Romans had formed an angry mob and were throwing things at the Argo, which was pointless since most of them fell back into the crowd.

Piper and Jason were surrounded by several dozen demigods, and were failing at calming them down. There was no way Pipers charmspeak was going to work against that many angry demigods. Jason’s forehead was bleeding and his purple cloak had been ripped to shreds. He kept repeating something, but I couldn’t hear what it was over the rest of the noise. The warship was still firing spears lit with Greek fire, which I’m assuming didn’t help matters. One landed in a nearby toga shop and blasted it to rubble…

Reyna cursed and pointed towards the Pomerian line, “Look.” Two artillery crews had set up catapults just outside the Pomerian Line and were preparing to fire at the _Argo II_.

“That’s not going to help anything, it’s just going to annoy Hedge, and that’s the last thing we need right now,” I muttered to Annabeth.

“I hate my job,” Reyna rushed off towards the legionnaires, her dogs by her side.

Annabeth’s head whipped around desperately, and she ducked under two Romans, plunging into the crowd. I realised that she was running towards Percy, who was standing in the fountain in front of his two friends (Frank and Hazel…I think) blasting the Romans with water.

I ran towards the Argo, remembering that Leo was still up there. Another explosion rocked the forum, directly above my head. One of the catapults had fired, and it went straight through the hull of the ship. I noticed a figure trying to climb down the shaking rope ladder. It was the blonde augur, Octavian, his face black with soot and his robes charred.

“Annabeth!” Percy shouted. “What happened?”

“I don’t know!” She yelled in reply.

“I’ll tell you what happened!” cried a voice from behind me. Octavian had reached the bottom of the ladder. “The Greeks have betrayed our trust! Leo has fired on Rome!”

My breath caught in my throat. Leo would never…Would he?

A rock came flying towards my head, and I dodged before continuing to run through the mob trying to get to the ship.

“You’re lying,” I shouted, at the same time Annabeth said, “Leo would never-“

“I was just there!” Octavian shrieked. “I saw it with my own eyes!”

The Argo II blasted one of the catapults, causing the legionnaires to scatter.

“You see?” Octavian screamed. “Romans, kill them!”

We were outnumbered a hundred to one, and we would never be able to convince the Romans that Octavian had staged a trick (which was the most likely explanation) before we were overpowered and killed.

Percy, Annabeth and Hazel had a short conversation, Hazel putting on her helmet and whistling, a piercing noise that I could hear even over the din. A blur of beige dashed across the forum, and a horse materialised next to the fountain, rearing and scattering the mob. Hazel mounted the horse and drew her sword, and the horse took off through the crowd, pushing Romans back.

I heard Jason cry out from halfway across the forum, before a brick caught him above the eye, causing him to collapse.

Piper screamed, “Get back!” causing the mob to hesitate, but I knew the effects wouldn’t last. I couldn’t hope to reach them in time to help before the mob overran them. Percy looked at frank, saying a few words, before he and Annabeth dashed for the rope ladder. Annabeth grabbed my wrist, dragging me along with them. Percy yanked Octavian off the ladder and threw him into the mob, before we began to climb. Arrows flew past my head and another explosion almost made me lose my grip. When I was halfway up the ladder, I heard a roar, and chanced a glance down.

Romans screamed and scattered as a dragon charged towards the forum – a dragon who was even scarier than Festus had been before Leo had fixed him. It grabbed Jason and Piper, before flying into the air.

“Percy, what the heck is that?!” I screamed

“That...That’s Frank,” Percy said, a few feet above me. “He has a few special talents.”

“That’s an understatement,” Annabeth muttered, “Keep climbing!"

Without Frank's power and Hazel with her horse, we never would have made it up the ladder; but we climbed past a row of broken oars and onto the deck.

The rigging was on fire, the foresail was torn and the ship tilted dangerously to starboard.

Coach Hedge was nowhere to be seen, which I was thankful for, but Leo stood, calmly reloading the ballista. My insides froze.

“Leo!” Annabeth screamed. “What are you doing?”

“Destroy them…” He turned to face us; his eyes glazed over. His movements were stiff, like a robot’s.

He made to turn back to the ballista, but Percy tackled him. Leos head smacked against the deck, and his eyes rolled up in his head so I could only see the whites.

“Percy what the hell?!” I yelled.

The gray dragon circled the ship once and landed on the bow, placing down both Jason and Piper, who collapsed. I ran to them, while Annabeth ran for the helm. I made the mistake of looking over the rail and saw legionnaires in the forum, preparing flaming arrows. 

Hazel and Arion raced out of the city with a crowd chasing after them. More catapults were being wheeled into the forum, and the statues of Terminus were glowing purple, as if preparing for an attack.

Annabeth looked over the controls, obviously confused. Luckily, I had spent plenty of time with Leo when he was building the ship.

“Annabeth!” She looked at me. “Grab the aviation throttle, and pull it all the way back!”

The ship groaned; the bow tilted up at a terrifying angle. I slid down the deck and slammed painfully into the mast. The mooring lines snapped, and the Argo II shot into the clouds.

∘₊✧──────✧₊∘

After Leo had regained consciousness, we leaned him up against the mast. I ran down to the sickbay to grab him an icepack for his head.

When I returned, Leo looked about ready to cry at the state of the ship. The foresail was in tatters, the aft crossbows destroyed. Coach Hedge was furious, because the satellite that powered the internet and TV was blown to pieces. Festus, our masthead, was coughing up smoke like a hairball was stuck in his throat, and the ship was listing and shuddering as it flew.

Annabeth was standing over Leo, with her hands on her hips, a furious Percy at her side. Trust me, you do not want to be on Percy’s bad side when he’s angry. I made my way through the broken crossbows to stand next to Leo. Percy frowned at me, and made his way belowdecks.

“I don’t know. It’s fuzzy.”

Annabeth crossed her arms, frowning. “You mean you don’t remember?”

“No. No, I remember, but it’s like I was watching myself. I couldn’t control it.

Coach Hedge tapped his bat against the deck.

“Look,” Hedge said, “The way I see it, you blew up some stuff, attacked some Romans, which is brilliant, but did you really have to knock out the satellite? I was in the middle of watching a cage match.”

“Coach,” I said through gritted teeth, “why don’t you go and make sure all the fires are out?”

“I already did that.”  
  
“Go and do it again.”

He trotted off, muttering under his breath.

Annabeth knelt next to Leo.

“Leo,” she said, “did Octavian trick you? Did he set you up, or-“

“No. He might have been an idiot, but he didn’t fire the ballistae. I did.”

Frank scowled. “On purpose?”

Leo shut his eyes. “No! Well, kind of…I didn’t want to. But I felt like I wanted to. Something was making me do it. There was this cold feeling, and-“

“A cold feeling.” Annabeth’s voice had a new edge to it. She sounded almost…scared.

“Yeah,” Leo said, “Why?”

From belowdecks, Percy called, “Annabeth, Lia, we need you!”

As soon as they had landed on the deck with Frank, Piper had taken Jason to the sickbay, to try and treat his head wound.

“Hey, Leo,” I said, “Don’t worry, Jason will be fine.” I squeezed his hand and stood up.

“Frank,” Annabeth’s expression softened when she looked at Leo’s worried one, “We’ll be back. Just…watch Leo. Please.”

Frank nodded, but I noticed Leo’s face fall.

Annabeth and I made our way to the stairs.

“Great going Annie,” I whispered.

“What?” She gave me a questioning look.

“He already feels like crap, and you just had to go and make him feel even worse.”

“How- oh. Oh Gods, I didn’t mean it like that.” Annabeth sucked in a breath and covered her mouth with her hand, realising how Leo may have taken her asking Frank to watch him. 

“ _I_ know that, but _he_ doesn’t.” Annabeth made to speak again, but I interrupted her.

“You recognised that cold feeling Leo was talking about, didn’t you.” It wasn’t a question; I already knew the answer. You can’t be someone’s best friend for 4 years without picking up some of their body language.

Annabeth took a deep breath and dug the heels of her palms into her eyes, “Yeah,” she let out a breath, “Yeah I did. I felt it too, before we anchored in New Rome.”

“And you didn’t say anything because…?”

“I-“ Annabeth couldn’t finish her sentence, because just then, we reached the infirmary. Percy stuck his head out the door, smiling at Annabeth before looking at me and glaring. I rolled my eyes, stepping into the infirmary and pushing my sleeved up to my elbow. Jason was lying on a bed, pale and still unconscious

“Piper,” Annabeth began, her voice shaking, “What happened to him?”

“He,” Piper swallowed, “he got hit with a brick.” She buried her face in her hands, but a few tears leaked through and splashing on the floor.

I crossed the room in three strides and wrapped my arm around her shoulders, drawing her into my side.

“Pipes, if there’s one thing I learned from Will, it’s that head injuries always look worse than they are. And, luckily for Jason, Will taught me a lot of medical stuff before we left. Jason will be fine, don’t worry.”

Annabeth was rifling through the cabinets (it was kind of obvious she didn’t know where anything was).

I picked up a bandage that had fallen on the floor and threw it at her. It hit her in the back of the head, and she whipped around to glare at me, before noticing Pipers tears.

I motioned for her to swap places with me so I could treat Jason. Percy’s eyes burned in my back as I crossed the infirmary, but when I turned around, he moved his eyes to stare at the door.

“Holy mother of Hera Annabeth, you really did a number on this cabinet,” I laughed, trying to find the ambrosia and the bandages.

“Shut up,” she grumbled, though it was obvious she was trying not to laugh. I grabbed the supplies I needed and walked back to Jason’s side. Annabeth and Piper moved to the other bed so I had room to work. While I was healing Jason, I felt a pair of eyes trained on me, and since Annabeth was still reassuring Piper, that left one person. I finished healing Jason, giving Piper a vial of headache potion to give him when he wakes up, before grabbing Percy’s arm and dragging him down to the stables.

I stood opposite him, before raising my hand and striking his cheek in a head-turning slap.

“What the Hades, C.J.?“

“You’re acting like an idiot. Why do you keep glaring at me like _I’m_ the one who’s done something wrong?”

“Because Leo blew up New Rome, and our chances of an alliance, and you’re siding with him!”

“It wasn’t his fault! No normal human being moves like that, there was obviously something wrong with him!”

“How do you know that? And even if he was, it’s a good thing he was knocked out before he could do any more damage.”

“Speaking of being knocked out, what the Hades? I’ve seen you restrain people without knocking them out, why was this time any different!”

“Because he was exploding a city!”

“So you give him a concussion? When he’s the only one who knows how to sail this thing?” Percy at least had the decency to look sheepish. Before he could reply, Annabeth coughed. Smirking, she stepped out of the shadows, moving to stand next to me.

“Annie! Did Leo fire the ballista or not?”

“Well, yeah, but-“

Percy smirked at me triumphantly, pushing past me and Annabeth to run down the corridor and up the stairs to the main deck.

Annabeth and I shared a look before running after him. We caught up to him just as he emerged onto the deck.

Leo started, before turning around to face us. “Is Jason—?"

“He’s resting,” Annabeth said. “Piper’s keeping an eye on him, but he should be fine.” Leo visibly relaxed.

Percy gave him a hard look. “Annabeth says you _did_ fire the ballista?”

“Man, I—I don’t understand how it happened. I’m so sorry—”

 _“Sorry?”_ Percy growled.

“ _Percy_ , calm the hell down,” I whispered.

Annabeth put a hand on his chest. “We’ll figure it out later. Right now, we have to regroup and make a plan. What’s the situation with the ship?”

Leo’s legs looked like they were about to give out, so I moved forward to wrap my arm around his waist. For…no reason other than to support him.

He told us about the damages and the supplies we needed.

He was complaining about the lack of celestial bronze when Festus began to whirr and squeak.

“Perfect,” Leo sighed.

“What’s perfect?” Annabeth said. “I could use some _perfect_ right now.”

Leo managed a smile. “Everything we need in one place. Frank, why don’t you turn into a bird or something? Fly down and tell your girlfriend to meet us at the Great Salt Lake in Utah.”

∘₊✧──────✧₊∘

Once we got there, it wasn’t a comfortable (or safe) landing. With the oars damaged and the foresail torn, Leo could barely manage to control the landing. The rest of us strapped themselves in below — except for Coach Hedge, who insisted on standing by the forward rail, yelling, “YEAH! Bring it on, lake!”

As we crashed into the lake, the _Argo II_ listed dangerously to starboard, then righted itself and rocked on the surface of the lake. Machinery hummed as the aerial blades that were still working changed to nautical form.

Leo rang the _All clear_ bell and I unstrapped myself and ran up the stairs as quickly as I could. As I reached the top of the stairs, a tan stallion appeared on deck with Hazel Levesque on his back. He looked kind of like the horse Spirit from that show ‘Spirit: Riding Free’.

“How—? We’re in the middle of a lake! Can that thing fly?”

The horse whinnied angrily.

“Arion isn’t a thing. And he can’t fly,” Hazel said. “But he can run across just about anything. Water, vertical surfaces, small mountains—none of that bothers him.”

“Oh.”

Hazel was looking at Leo strangely, as if he was a puzzle she needed to solve. I was about to ask her why she was looking at him like she’d met him before, when Coach Hedge crept forward with his baseball bat, eyeing the magic horse suspiciously. “Valdez, Jackson, does this count as an invasion?”

“No!” I said.

“Um, Hazel, you’d better come with me. I built a stable belowdecks, if Arion wants to—” Leo began. 

“He’s more of a free spirit.” Hazel jumped out of the saddle. “He’ll graze around the lake until I call for him. But I want to see the ship. Lead the way.”

The _Argo II_ was designed like an ancient trireme, only it was twice the size. The first deck had one central corridor with crew cabins on either side. On a normal trireme, most of the space would’ve been taken up with three rows of benches for a few hundred sweaty guys to do the manual labour, but the oars were automated and retractable, so they took up hardly any room inside the hull. The ship’s power came from the engine room on the second and lowest deck, which also housed sickbay, storage, and the stables. Huh, I guess I do listen when Leo’s lecturing me on mechanics.

Leo led the way down the hall. The ship was built with ten cabins, one for each demigod, one for Coach Hedge (seriously – he was considered a responsible adult chaperone?) and one spare room to make it even (also because I had a vision that we would end up with another demigod on board – I couldn’t tell who). At the stern was a large mess hall/lounge, which was where we were headed.

On the way, we passed Jason’s room. The door was open and Piper sat at the side of his bed, holding Jason’s hand while he snored with an ice pack on his head.

Piper glanced at us. She held a finger to her lips for quiet, but she didn’t look angry at Leo. That was good. We kept walking, and when we reached the mess hall, we found the others - Percy, Annabeth, and Frank - sitting dejectedly around the dining table. I was glad to see that there was a hand shaped bruise forming on Percy’s cheek.

Leo had made the lounge as nice as possible, since he figured we’d be spending a lot of time there. The cupboard was lined with magic cups and plates from Camp Half-Blood, which would fill up with whatever food or drink we wanted on command. There was also a magical ice chest with canned drinks, perfect for picnics ashore. The chairs were cushy recliners with thousand-finger massage, built-in headphones, and sword and drink holders for all your demigod kicking-back needs. There were a few windows along the wall – Leo wanted to enchant the walls to show real-time footage of Camp, but I reminded him we were going on a death voyage, while the campers would be having a perfectly happy time, and we would have Romans with us, so he put in windows instead. Hazel moved to sit next to Frank, I sat opposite Annabeth and Leo sat next to me.

“So we’ve docked,” Percy said. “What now?”

Frank plucked his bowstring. “Figure out the prophecy? I mean...that _was_ a prophecy Ella recited, right? From the Sibylline Books?”

“The what?” Leo and I asked. I looked at him and smiled, before turning back to Frank. 

Frank explained how their harpy friend was freakishly good at committing books to memory. At some point, she’d memorised a collection of ancient prophecies that had supposedly been destroyed around the fall of Rome.

“That’s why you didn’t tell the Romans,” Leo guessed. “You didn’t want them to get hold of her.”

“Ella’s sensitive. She was a prisoner when we found her. I just didn’t want...” Percy made a fist. Annabeth laid a hand on his arm. “It doesn’t matter. I sent Tyson an Iris-message, told him to take Ella to Camp Half-Blood. They’ll be safe there.”

Annabeth laced her fingers through Percy’s. “Let me think about the prophecy later - right now we have bigger problems. We have to get this ship fixed. Leo, what do we need?”

“The easiest thing is tar. We can get that in the city, at a roofing-supply store or someplace like that. We also need Celestial Bronze and lime. Festus says we can find both of those on an island in the lake, just west of here.”

“We’ll have to be quick,” Hazel warned. “If I know Octavian, which unfortunately I do, he’s already searching for us with his auguries. The Romans will send a strike force after us. It’s a matter of honour.”

Leo felt everyone’s eyes on him. “Guys...I don’t know what happened. Honestly, I—”

Annabeth raised her hand. “We’ve been talking. We agree it couldn’t have been _you_ , Leo.”

“Which is what I’ve been saying all day,” I muttered. Annabeth shot me a warning look, and I glared at her.

“That cold feeling you mentioned...I felt it too,” she continued.

“It’s about time you said something,” Annabeth glared at me again.

“It must have been some sort of magic, either Octavian or Gaea or one of her minions. But until we understand what happened—”

Frank grunted. “How do we know it won’t happen again?"

Leo’s fingers began to twitch, like they always did when they were about to light on fire. I grabbed Leo’s hand to help calm him down.  
  
“We don’t,” I said, “but we have to trust. I think we should use the buddy system for now. Nobody goes anywhere alone. Who knows what Gaea has planned to destroy us, I mean she already had Leo possessed or something, what if she does it to someone else?”

“Yeah, that’s a good idea,” Leo agreed, “We can leave Piper, Cora and Coach here with Jason. Send one team to get tar and another to get bronze and lime.”

“What? Why do I have to stay?”

“Split up?” Percy said. “That doesn’t sound like a good idea.”

“I don’t see you offering up any other ideas.” Percy scowled at me.

“It’ll be quicker,” Hazel reasoned. “Besides, there’s a reason a quest is usually limited to three demigods, right?”

Annabeth raised her eyebrows, as if she didn’t expect Hazel to be logical. “You’re right. The same reason we needed the ship...outside of camp, seven powerful demigods in one place will attract way too much attention – and not the good kind. The Argo II is designed to hide and protect us. We should be safe enough on board; but if we go on missions, we shouldn’t travel in groups larger than three. There’s no reason to alert Gaea’s minions if we don’t have to.”

Percy still didn’t look happy about it, but he took Annabeth’s hand. “As long as you’re my buddy, I’m good.”

Hazel smiled. “Frank, you were brilliant earlier, turning into a dragon! Could you do it again to fly Annabeth and Percy into town to get the tar?”

Frank opened his mouth like he wanted to protest. “I...yeah sure. But what about you?”

“I’ll ride Arion with Sa — with Leo, here.” Her slip up made me wonder what she was going to say instead of Leo. She fidgeted with her sword hilt. “We’ll get the bronze and the lime. We can all meet back here before it gets dark.”

Frank scowled. For some, reason, he didn’t want Leo and Hazel going off alone. If I’m being honest, I felt the same way.

“Leo,” said Annabeth, “when we get the supplies, how long will it take to fix the ship?”

“With luck, just a few hours.”

“Fine,” she decided. “We’ll meet you back here as soon as possible, but stay safe. We could use some good luck. Of course, that doesn’t mean we’ll get it, but we can hope.”


End file.
